Post navigation

Hurricane Sandy 2 years later – @SaveTheChildren asks: Are You Prepared? (#GetReady #PANJ4Good)

Hard to believe that today, October 29th, is the 2-year anniversary of Hurricane Sandy’s U.S. landfall. We were inundated with so much wind and rain, we were worried that our 1817 farmhouse wouldn’t make it to its 200th birthday.

We were pretty much in the center of the track of the storm, which didn’t look good (in between those two “S” characters on the map):

We lost power for four days when the high winds took out a row of electric poles less than a mile from our house, also closing the main road that runs past our house:

Without power to our sump pump, the basement kept flooding in a big way, and the fire department was kind enough to make many trips over those four days to continuously pump the water out so we wouldn’t have bigger issues if the water reached new heights and flooded the first floor.

While we lost many items from the basement flooding constantly during the storm (my biggest loss was lots of my wine ended up submerged, rendering it worthless because of the potential bacteria in the water seeping into the corks). In spite of losing practically everything stored in the basement, it was a mere pittance to some closer to the coast who lost power for many more days, and some even lost their homes and businesses.

It was a sad time for sure.

Hurricane Sandy affected 24 states, killed 162 people, caused more than $50 million in damage and damaged or destroyed 650,000 homes and hundreds of child care centers and schools. It was the day that life turned upside down for thousands of children who suddenly lost everything – including their very sense of stability.

Save the Children is still working with many of these children to help them rebound. Their recent poll shows that 49% of U.S. parents don’t feel the very prepared to protect their children from disaster. That’s almost half!

51% don’t think their child’s school or child care center is very prepared either.

A whopping 74% of parents don’t think the federal government is prepared to protect their kids should disaster strike!

Make sure you’re prepared to make sure children are better protected from disaster. How, you ask?

Lassie encourages people to pack and prepare:

What happens if disaster strikes when you’re apart? Save the Children asks: Do you have a plan to stay connected with your family? Are you and your state prepared to protect children? Find out. Thenpledge to do more.

Here is a handy printable Disaster plan checklists for parents and families (click on the image to be taken to a new window for full size for printing):

Here is a recent picture of children from New York City’s Lower East Side expressing their feelings through drawing in Save the Children’s Journey of Hope program:

This picture goes back to shortly after Sandy, with 4-year-old Didi in Save the Children’s “Child-Friendly Space” at a NJ shelter:

Losing your entire sense of stability at such a young age can be devastating. Save the Children’s Journey of Hope program allows children to express their feelings and learn critical coping skills that allow them to bounce back and more forward.

Without adequate support, children often fall permanently behind in school while they grapple with intense sadness, depression and anger. Two years after Hurricane Sandy, Save the Children continues their work with children in the hardest-hit communities in New York and New Jersey.

For more information, check out an informativeInfographic with key statsfrom Save the Children’s 2014 Disaster Report Card and poll of US parents.

Sign the pledge to protect children from disaster and encourage your followers to do the same. We’ll share this with your state government if it doesn’t meet our disaster report card preparedness standards for schools and child care.

.

Note: I wrote this post as a PA/NJ Blogger for Social Good. Even though I’m all the way over on the Left Coast now, it was home for 16+ years, so I’m still connected and continue to want to help any way I can. No monetary compensation implied or otherwise was received for this post.

About StacyUncorked

After 20+ years in the Corporate World and years of infertility, Stacy was surprised when Princess Nagger made her miraculous appearance - deciding to forgo the career and stay home was a no-brainer. As if her hands weren't full enough, 8 years later she and her husband added Little Dude through adoption, adding a whole new dimension (of crazy) to their family and even more sleepless nights.
When she’s not refereeing kids, dogs and cats, she loves to write, hence the reason she decided to start her little blog, and because she never got a baby book to mark milestones, this was the next best thing. She also enjoys doing reviews and giveaways for products she or her family would willingly use and can stand behind.
She loves to cook and try new techniques to turn ordinary into extraordinary. Crafty by nature, she takes on a lot of unique projects and enjoy seeing the end result. Her favorite, of course, is making her award winning wine out of fruits and grapes. Experiments with water currently underway.

Father’s Day is coming up! If you haven’t figured out what to get the amazing father in your life something cool, I’ve got some great ideas for you, especially if that special someone is a techy geek (hey, that’s not … Continue reading →

I don’t know about you, but biscotti happens to be one of my guilty pleasures. Especially Nonni’s, because they are always so delicious, they’re addicting! Nonni’s bakes the warmth of the holidays into its gourmet dunking cookies, which are only … Continue reading →

One thought on “Hurricane Sandy 2 years later – @SaveTheChildren asks: Are You Prepared? (#GetReady #PANJ4Good)”

I can’t believe that it has been two years…. I also can’t believe how 730 days later so many people continue to suffer… We were without power for about a month. Much of our home was destroyed.. LIfe will never be the same…

No stealing!

Whatcha looking for?

Pinteresting…

Categories

Categories

Stacy Swenson Johnson

After 20+ years in the Corporate World and years of
infertility, Stacy was surprised when Princess Nagger made her miraculous appearance
- deciding to
forgo the career and stay home was a no-brainer. As if her hands weren’t full
enough, 8 years later she and her husband added Little Dude through adoption,
adding a whole new dimension to their family and even more sleepless nights.

When she’s not refereeing kids, dogs and cats, she loves to write, hence the
reason she decided to start her little blog, and because she never got a baby
book to mark milestones, so this was the next best thing. She also enjoys doing reviews and giveaways for
products she or her family would willingly use and can stand behind.

She loves to cook and try new techniques to turn ordinary into extraordinary.
Crafty by nature, she takes on a lot of unique projects and enjoy seeing the end
result. Her favorite, of course, is making her award winning wine out of fruits
and grapes. Experiments with water currently underway.